I moved to the Middle East!
It's been quite a while since my last post. I think I was in Thailand in October of last year. There is a reason for that. Usually I only put up a post when I've done some traveling and the only traveling I did after October was between family members homes.
I had the longest unpaid break between jobs of my entire life. Usually I take a week or two off between jobs but this time it took a long time to find another job and then still longer while I jumped through hoops for visa's and to get the job.
Well, here I finally am in the UAE (United Arab Emirates). It only took about 5 months from when my application was accepted for interview until I landed in this new(for me) country. I'll tell you it was a bit of adventure.
A recruiter passed my application on to the Ministry of Education and they accepted at the beginning of December 2015. I had an interview at the end of January which I think I nailed. Four days later I was offered a tentative position based on my getting a visa. The visa process started immediately, that's not to say anything happened. Around the beginning of March I got an official contract, though it was still dependant on my getting a visa, but I figured if I got an official contract then I had the visa. Five weeks later the visa process was complete and I had about 36hrs to get on a plane. They told me friday morning and my flight was Saturday afternoon. They paid for it so I didn't have much say, but it would have been nice to get together with my family one last time. Oh well, there would be a payoff in the near future.
I landed in Abu Dahbi and someone was waiting there to take me to the hotel and help me get a sim card for my phone. The MoE put me up at the Dusit Thani which is a 5+ star hotel. Man was that a nice place,wish I had some pics of the place. Three buffets a day with amazing food at every one. I hope to stay there again one day!
That evening I was contacted by a banker. I was currious about how he got my number but apparently its a service the government sets up to make things a little easier. I was nervous about signing things but it all worked out.
The next day was being carted around doing blood tests and applications for a residence card then off to the next city which was Sharjah. It's about 30mins from Dubai. Had a short meeting there about nothing and then I was off to another 5 star hotel for 7 nights while I shadowed a project teacher to see what I was supposed to do.
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| Pool view at the Bustan Rotani 5 Star Hotel |
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| you can see the Burj Khalifa kinda shadowed in the background |
After three days of following him around I felt pretty decent about the daily things I would be doing. Then off to another hotel and my placement.
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| My room for the first month |
My one up boss took me to the school I would work at. It was way out in the desert. Takes about an hour to drive there. Everyone there was super nice so I felt pretty good about the people I would work with.
By now I'm in my third week of work here but I hadn't really done anything except have brief meetings with my boss and then the rest of the day off. This experience has been the easiest I've eased into a job. And then the terrors of public schools in the UAE. WOW, those kids are crazy. Hopefully, when the new school year starts things will be better or its going to be a LONG two years here. Oh ya, I taught a few lessons over the next two weeks and then, suddenly, all the students stopped coming to school. After a week of sitting around chatting and getting to know the other teachers it was final exams.
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| some of the people I work with |
Still nothing for me to do, so I sat around until finally the school years ended. Now I'm vacation for basically 5 or 6 weeks. (due to a stupid law I have to work one day a week for the final three weeks before the new school year starts, no biggy. I started work one day late)
Thats the job. Life here? Pretty good. I was offered a credit card and a large personal loan by the bank so I bought a car.
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| getting the windows tinted cuz it's freakin' hot and freakin' sunny here |
KIA Sorento. Fully loaded. Even the seats have airconditioning.
Since I have to drive so much I figured,get a decent vehicle that I will enjoy driving, and driving I do. Here are some of the sights I see while going to and from work.
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| Camels in the desert. They are not wild, just wandering around free |
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| They like to walk on the road too. I was warned about them many times when I got here. |
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| They even stare at you as you go past. |
Driving in the desert can be interesting. Some of the scenery is really quite nice to look at. Maybe it's because it's all new to me, but I plan on going out to take a few pictures at some point during my summer break.
I lived in the hotel for four weeks and then I found a friend to move in with.
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| My kitchen |
It's a typical two bedroom apartment, but it's on the sixteenth floor and has a decent view.
You can kind of see a mosque mid right of the picture. Ramadan came in June this year and that mosque has been a pain in the a**. It turns it's loudspeakers on at two in the morning and blares music or sermons for around an hour. I will not be living here next year during Ramadan and I really hope it stops once Ramadan is done, but my experience in Malaysia doesn't give me much hope.
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| Ampitheatre across from my last hotel. |
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| There is a path all the way around this body of water. it's really a nice area but it's just to damn hot to go outside. |
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| 46 degrees Celcius. And thats not even as hot as it gets here. AND there is humidity! |
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| Middle of Dubai Mall the largest mall in the world |
Well that's about it for now. I will try and post a few more pictures in the near future, but like I said, it's just to hot to go outside here. Can't wait for winter when the temps drop down to around 30 or so. It's going to feel chilly!
